lumia 800

It's a Lumia 800 white announcement day today it seems, and now Nokia Netherlands has decided to join in with a video introduction of the handset. This is a perfect addition to the Lumia family of Windows Phones from the Finnish manufacturer, we've got a number of black handsets so it's good to see some opposite options being made available (and we know Apple fans go crazy for white versions of the iProducts).

As mentioned in the announcement, the white Lumia 800 will be heading to the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Scandinavia, Finland, Poland and Switzerland first, with other countries to follow.

To fit in nicely with Nokia showing off the upcoming Lumia 800 white version, SlashGear have got their hands on the device. Looking fairly impressive, this handset features a unique feature that differentiates this version from the other themed 800s. As can be seen in the above video (as well as the photo shots below) the white 800 sports a glossy finish, bouncing light in all manner of directions, and looks almost identical to the N9 variant.

Don't allow the glossy look to fool you though, this is still a polycarbonate unibody that has been dyed all the way through. The white Lumia 800 is expected to be available later this month in the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Scandinavia, Finland, Poland and Switzerland, with other countries to follow. Check out a few shots of the handset after the break. So, what colour are you?

Heck, we're even hearing that some Nokia flagship stores are being renamed, temporarily, to Lumia stores. Not a bad deal and we're real excited to see how Indonesia kicks things off here as they will be an important market to watch.

The magenta version of the Lumia 800 is well on its way with Carphone Warehouse expecting the handset to be available this month. Joining the cyan and black colours, it will be interesting to see how the pink catches the eyes of females and those who would be fond of such a coloured phone (I personally owned a j700 back in the day).

Should you be eager to see what plans you can get Nokia's magenta Windows Phone on, check out Phones4U (link below) who have got O2, Orange and Vodafone contracts available, from just £20 a month.

According to a report at e's Phoneblog and Kauppalehti the Lumia 800, which launched in Finland yesterday, has been selling at a fairly fast rate. Jonne works at Gigantti (an electronics retailer) and states that while he doesn't know the exact Lumia 800 sale figures at the store, he has sold more handsets than he did N8s within two days of the Symbian handset being launched.

Elisa's Executive Vice President, Henri Korpi, told Kauuppalehti today that they have sold out of Nokia's mid-range Windows Phone in some of their stores. Still no numbers provided, but we are expecting to see some positive feedback should figures become available. What makes this story extra special is that Lumia 800 buyers in the land of Nokia are braving snow storms (-27°C) to reach retailers. Now that is dedication.

The Lumia 800 launched in Belgium yesterday and to celebrate it Nokia took "The Amazing Everyday" to a number of railway stations, where commuters (and travelers alike) could receive a free cupcake.

Not only this, but the organisers have planned an "Amazing Moments" contest (much like what we saw in France not so long ago), which will see entrants choosing from five amazing moments offered (or create your own) and explaining the reasons why they made that choice. A panel of judges will then select winners. We're looking forward to see some more unique marketing from the manufacturer.

It only takes a few hours to go by before we get a new report of a Nokia launch somewhere. While the info may not be of interest to all of our readers, it's important for the OS to spread as far and wide as possible. And having Windows Phone with Nokia's backing land in Indonesia is nothing to ignore either. With nearly 240 million people, it's a fairly large population yearning for some smartphone technology from the likes of Redmond and Finland. So it's with great interest to see Indonesian news site Detikinet reporting that the Lumia 710 and 800 are both headed to that country within in weeks:

"Anvid Erdian, Product Manager Nokia Indonesia stated that Nokia is still as planned in the series Lumia brought to Indonesia in Q1 2012. "Approximately in February"...The price is pegged in the range of Rp 5 million to Lumia 800 and Rp 3 million for Lumia 710."

We're also told by reader Rahadyan that Nokia has two events in preparation for the launch that may interest some locals:

Mesin Waktu Nokia (Translation: Nokia Time Machine), a contest in the form of Facebook app where a user can pick his/her favorite classic Nokia phones, then type in his/her memory about using the phone. The prizes are 5 Lumia 800 and 5 Lumia 710. www.mesinwaktunokia.com (redirect to Facebook app)

Nokia Developer Day: Coding 24 hours. This event, collaborating with Microsoft Indonesia, will be held on 4-5 February 2012. Nokia+Microsoft hope to gather 800 developers and challenge them to create 800 apps for Windows Phone in the course of 24 hours. Those apps will then be submitted to the Indonesian Marketplace. A little twist: this event will be monitored by the Indonesian Record Museum (Museum Rekor Indonesia / MURI), the Indonesian equivalent of Guinness World Record, and will be registered as the largest developer coding event in Indonesia if they manage to attract 800 developers. Link.

Sounds like that could be a lot of fun. Hopefully we'll get some on-the-ground feedback once everything starts.

Good news for those in New Zealand--you'll be getting both the Nokia Lumia 710 and the Lumia 800 come March, finally bringing some solid Gen 2 devices your way.

The big winner is Telecom NZ who will be getting both devices with the "exclusive" interestingly on the 710, while Vodafone NZ will be getting the Lumia 800 for their customers. The info comes by way of two sources: Nokia NZ who Tweeted as much earlier today and reader Matt H. who sent us this flyer from his local Telecom store, proudly featuring both Lumias as "coming soon".

Taking note of a number of Lumia 800 launch parties occurring across the world, the Czech Republic has joined in with Nokia putting on a show in Prague on January 26th to celebrate the launch of the 710 and 800 (February 1st). Two hundred journalists, developers and devoted fans were selected for the event, which featured a number of cool presentations and gimmicks.

From Windows Phone cakes to a water-rippling Lumia 800 floor projection, it looked like a unique experience to say the least. Nokia also began advertising the 710 and 800 in Prague (and beyond) as can be seen in the below photo, taken by Martin Suchan in a subway.

Nokia has confirmed the upcoming arrival of the Lumia 800 to Australia in a press statement today. Not only that, but the manufacturer stated that the handset will be available in cyan, magenta, black andthe rumoured white. Australian carriers (Optus, Telstra and Vodafone) have shown interest in Nokia's Windows Phone (possibly due to the launches that have been hosted across the world), which is good news for those who are looking for better platform support and more generation two handsets.

We've continuously seen reports of frustration from consumers in Australia due to the lack of support from not only the carriers, but Microsoft itself. With Nokia tackling world domination, looks like this commonwealth nation will be seeing some love. If you're interested as to when Telstra will be sporting the device, be sure to register your interest.

The O2 UK blog has featured the Nokia Lumia 800 in an article that recommends top smartphones for different consumer needs and desires. The Samsung Galaxy Nexus is the "must have for anyone who wants the latest and greatest", but it's the Lumia 800 that interests us with being recommended as the perfect option for those what want something different.

"As good as all of the above devices are, they're all part of the established order of smartphone devices and platforms. If you yearn for something a little different, the Nokia Lumia 800 will be like a breath of fresh air.

First up there's the phone’s unique design, which adopts an unusual all-in-on polycarbonate shell that's as durable as it is striking to look at. What really makes the Lumia 800 feel fresh is its Windows Phone Mango operating system, which presents a heavily stylised but ultra-intuitive interface and peerless compatibility with Microsoft Office and Xbox Live."

Not a bad description, eh? Nice to see O2 actually recognise the beauty of not only Nokia's hardware, but Microsoft's mobile OS. If you'd like to note something else that's relatively interesting - the O2 UK blog header features Windows Phones (see above image).

Yesterday we detailed Vodacom's launch deal for the Nokia Lumia 800 which was announced at the launch event. This is a short follow-up post with some pictures from the event, so you can see what you missed! The entirety of the Vodacom Dome has been branded with Metro tiles advertising the Nokia Lumia 800 and Windows Phone.

On the heals of the Samsung Omnia W heading to our friends Down Under, news is circulating the Nokia Lumia 800 is heading to the Australian market. The Nokia Windows Phone will be offered through Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone and should be available sometime in March. Pricing information is not available at this time.

In addition to the Lumia 800, Australia should expect the Lumia 710 to become available sometime after March and there are hints that the Lumia 900 will be headed to Australia as well.

Vodacom just held a really amazing launch party to welcome the Nokia Lumia 800 (and the 710 at a later stage) Windows Phone to South Africa. This particular event was the one we previously spoke about being held in Midrand.

Nokia South Africa recently announced that the Lumia 800 would be available from the 7th February. However yesterday we learned of a promotion starting tomorrow for the phone. The latter turns out to be correct and will most probably mark the start of the rollout to stores nationwide.

Nokia has published a number of photos in an album on their Facebook account. The album ("Nokia Lumia Production") allows the viewer to see how the Lumia family of Windows Phones are produced before heading out to owners across the world.

The workers who make all this magic happen were also in the spotlight at Nokia World 2011 with a live feed being broadcasted to the audience. Check out some more shots from the album after the break.

Nice to see the Nokia Lumia 800 getting some air-time, especially up in Sweden who just official launched the device, well, yesterday actually.

The above ad is from Swedish carrier Halebop, which we're told is owned by Telia (the largest carrier in Sweden). We've also been informed that, roughly speaking what is being said in the commercial is "Dark and cold outside? Then I think it's time for a surprise, a mobile that is also social".

Certainly using the Lumia 800's colors against the black and white snow gives a great contrast and is quite eye catching.

The official date for the Lumia 800 release in South Africa was set for the 7th of February, but Simon Dingle has just tweeted out the image above.

If you struggle to read white on red, then here's the breakdown: The Nokia Lumia 800 will see it's first promotion on the 26'th January starting at 8AM. The first 200 people to purchase will get a free XBOX (presumably a 360). Seems like a pretty good deal, although obviously there is no pricing mentioned.

So what is the significance of the 26'th? That's the morning after the Nokia Lumia 800 launch event held at the Vodacom Dome, which is tomorrow.

We like the idea of white phones only because they stand out in a sea of black-slabs these days. Between our (mostly) white Lumia 710 and all-white Radar 4g, we think the color variation adds some pizzazz and choices to the second gen Windows Phone lineup. So it's with great excitement that we're seeing more and more evidence that Nokia is making a white Lumia 800.

Evidence first came forth a few days ago at XDA where a screenshot (see below) from fshqbizfs. Evidently, he was using an app that browses Nokia firmware and came across some interesting findings. From that screenshot we see listings for a white v2 Lumia 800 coming to Portugal and Switzerland.

And we now have the above screenshot from reader VoodooKing (top picture) who was searching for Nokia ROMs on their server to corroborate those entries. As you can see, there are the same listings for Portugal and Switzerland, giving a little more credence to the earlier screenshot from XDA.

Of course, these could be mislabeled or errant entries but we should note that there is a all-white Nokia N9 (which of course the Lumia 800 is based off), meaning there is precedent for such a design. We're of course excited about such a prospect and hope Nokia sells an unlocked version--between the Cyan and White variations, we think Nokia could have some big sellers here.

Vodafone has always been creative when it comes to television advertising, whether we have bees walking into shop windows, or someone taking photos of himself and a sleeping lady on a flight and getting caught in the act. In the above video, we have a couple preparing to enjoy a meal and are joined by Yoda (a powerful Jedi from Star Wars). He offers to transfer the man's contacts from the old mobile phone to the new Lumia 800 Windows Phone, using the force.

The advert's message is covering contact transferring that Vodafone can do in-store for customers (RED Box service), but it's good to see a Windows Phone being used as prop.